Infinite
by Cori Fiero
Summary: "The Planet had fallen ill with the scourge of the human race...As he put it, it was 'time to return Her to those whom she belongs'." Sephiroth/Aeris AU
1. Prologue

"All right, settle down. I get it. You already know this story. You're sick of it. You've read it in books, seen it in movies – you've even played games based on it. The whole thing has become a trope to you. The age-old tale of good triumphing over evil. And it's pretty cut and dry, right? This side is good. This side is evil. Black and white. Simple as that.

"Except it's never really that simple, is it? The real world has gray areas. Oh, and there's something else you have to take into account here.

"'History is written by the victors.'

"So what do you do when you want to know the truth? You go to the source. That's what this is. This purports to be the factual account of the events that transpired all that time ago, told by those who were actually there. This is the story of Aeris, and Sephiroth, and a terrible corporation known as Shin-Ra…"


	2. Part 1-1

_Aeris_

The first thing I lost was time.

Then my appetite, and then sleep…then, towards the end, I started to lose my hold on reality.

Possibly the drugs had something to do with it.

They never came right out and told me what they were doing, but I could only assume the green stuff they injected me with day after day wasn't food coloring. It was awful, whatever it was. It made me feel sick. Throwing up my insides until blood came out became a regular thing. The cold men in the white lab coats didn't care. Every day they would come to stick me with their needles and jab at me until I was black and blue. Sometimes they'd mutter their little notes to themselves.

"Specimen A. Blood tests normal. No unusual genetic markers. IMG elevated. Responding well to treatment. Tenderness and discoloration at test site. IMG levels to be monitored…"

Oh sure, tenderness and discoloration. _That _was the real problem here.

Soon I noticed the world was fading away. Sounds were duller; faces had no features. I couldn't tell the difference between the monsters outside and my reflection in the glass.

Then the lights went out.

At first I thought I'd fallen asleep. The lights _never _went out. They were out for a good long while too, and when they came back there was silence. No steady whirring from the machines the Lab Coats liked to shake their heads at. No sighs from the other specimens that had already given up crying. I was petrified. Was everone just…gone? Was that possible? If I could somehow gather the energy to push on the door that trapped me inside, would it open? As soon as the thought came to me, I pushed it away. It didn't matter. I didn't have the energy anyway.

The eery quiet was abruptly broken by a pounding of footsteps. It sounded like a lot of them. Anxious voices whispered loudly to each other.

"How did this happen?"

"Who could have done this?"

"The floor, look! Look at the floor! It looks like…like it leads…up…this way…"

Through the glass of my cell, I could four or five people I didn't recognize. They weren't Lab Coats at all. In fact, the man at the front was wearing a black SOLDIER uniform. Of course. Probably investigating the power outage. Weird; I wouldn't have expected the military to get involved in something so ordinary. Then again, I wouldn't have expected a _power_company to ever _lose power,_either.

The whole group walked right past me without a second glance. They were too busy with their hushed theories to notice me, I guess. One of them – a girl I think – seemed to think better of it and doubled back.

"Cloud!" she hissed. "Come here!"

"What is it?" the SOLDIER asked. His eyes met mine and he shuddered.

"Look at her. She looks sick. Don't you think we should do something?"

Before she was finished talking, he was already backing away. "No. There's something different about her. I don't like it. Her eyes…she reminds me of – no. Forget it. Let's go."

They were gone as quickly as they'd appeared.

The lights went out again.

This time, I knew I had dozed off. I woke up to the same creepy silence as before – only now I had company. A faceless man stood at the now-open door. He didn't say anything; he just stared, his head tilted slightly with interest. For several long minutes he stayed that way. It would have been uncomfortable if I hadn't been so used to it. I expected him to force me to my feet and drag me to the lab as usual. But he didn't. Instead he knelt down, tucked his hands gently under my head and knees, and scooped me up like a china doll.

After that I can only remember things in flashes. A dark hallway. Feeling jostled as he walked – down a stairway maybe? Cool air hitting my cheek. The sound of fluttering feathers. My stomach lurching, like I was on an elevator that was moving a little too fast. That breeze again. My foot catching on something. The low tone of his voice as he cursed out loud. Indoors. Weightlessness. A bed of chocobo feathers. No, lighter than that. A cloud. I was sinking into a cloud, drifiting away, drifting...


	3. Part 1-2

_Aeris_

At some point I became aware of the fact that I was awake.

I could feel that I was in a bed, an honest-to-goodness bed, with a mattress and blankets and everything. I was in a real bedroom too. There were curtains on the window. There was carpet on the floor. Best of all, I was completely alone. No other specimens to break my heart, no Lab Coats to ruin the peace. And I was _clean. _My skin felt smoother than it had in years, covered in an oversized shirt that sure as hell wasn't mine. Someone had gone to the trouble of washing my hair with something that smelled like strawberries. They'd even tied it in a loose braid for me.

It was hard not to get excited. All I wanted was to burrow deep into the sheets and close my eyes again. Then realization hit like a bucket of ice water.

_What if I'd been kidnapped for more dangerous experiments?_

What they had done so far left me half out of my mind. The thought that it could get worse tied my stomach up in knots. Right on cue, the bedroom door swung open, and I let out a small cry in spite of myself. The man in the doorway chuckled.

"Relax. I won't hurt you. At least, I don't _think _I will. I've never made this tea before. It might be horrendous," he said, indicating the mug he'd been holding. It had the distinct scent of pine needles. I wasn't entirely sure I wanted it. Evidently I didn't have a choice; it was shoved into my hands before I could answer. Well, the warmth was nice anyway. It wouldn't hurt to just _hold _it, right?

It seemed that my kidnapper was bent on making conversation. He sat on the edge of the bed and gave me one of those lingering stares that makes you wonder if you're about to be stabbed through the chest. "You're looking much better," he offered. Sure, we could make small talk at each other. Or we could talk about what was really going on here.

"Sephiroth." I pronounced the name carefully. "Why are you doing this?"

The casual smile fell instantly from his face. "You know who I am," he said, more disappointed than surprised. It was almost cute.

"Well, yeah. Are you kidding? Everyone knows who you are. I'm sorry, but a black cable knit sweater isn't much of a disguise when your face is plastered all over Midgar." To get back to the point I added, "Do you know who I am?" _An orphan off the streets? An insignificant experiment? Specimen X?_

"I do. Your name is Aeris Gainsborough – though the surname is borrowed from the woman who took you in. Your parents died when you were very young. You lost your father before you'd learned to walk. He was an educated man, a scientist I believe. And your mother…she was an Ancient. The last pure-blooded Cetra in existence. A beautiful, gracious, loving creature. She was everything to you. Your whole world revolved around her. Then she was stolen from you by a group of Turks. Ever since then, you've had to live in the slums, pretending to be grateful for what you have. Isn't that right?"

The mug nearly slipped out of my grasp. _How…? _How did he know? Where could he have found such intimate knowledge about me? The lab? Had he been watching me all along? Was he…one of _them? _How long had this been going on? And why, _why _would he bring it up like that? What would possess someone to dredge up something so obviously painful? Unless…_oh. Of course. _The calm look on his face, the way he patiently waited for an answer – he had no idea. It made sense. The man had spent his entire life under the watchful eye of Shinra. Not a company exactly known for teaching social etiquette.

"That's a terrible thing to say," I said quietly.

"But it's true, isn't it?"

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he was just an ass.

If I had tried to answer in words, tears would have come out, so I gave a silent nod instead.

"No…hey. It's okay," he said with an awkward pat on my cheek. Awkward but well-intentioned. I couldn't help noticing the kindness in his eyes, mostly because I didn't expect it. "I can fix this. I have a plan. Now that I have someone who hates Shinra as much as I do – "

"What? Why? What did they ever do to you?"

A kind of darkness fell over him. He pulled away, sinking back into the threatening stranger he'd been when he'd first entered the room. "Oh. I see. You're right; that _was _a terrible thing to say."

Neither of us said a word for a very long time. I might as well have been back in my glass prison, with him as a passing observer. Suddenly I felt short of breath. This was about to go very, very wrong. In my head I started to plan out my escape route. The window was always an option. No, he'd count on that. The door? Don't be stupid. There was no way I could outrun a legendary SOLDIER like Sephiroth. If he attacked me, I didn't stand a chance.

_That doesn't mean you have to make it easy for him._

Okay, that voice in my head sounded an awful lot like…

"You said, umm…you had a – a plan?"

It was out of my mouth before I could stop it. Well, half of it was. I had to force myself to finish the rest of it. After all, it was ridiculous. Here I was, scared for my life, picturing all the gruesome things that were about to happen to me – and I asking him to go into _detail. _I don't know why I did it. Maybe it was the way his expression softened when he spoke to me. _"Hey. It's okay." _Like he gave a damn.

There it was again. The light behind those cold, gray eyes that gave them so much warmth. All of a sudden he couldn't get the words out fast enough. Humans, he said, had been allowed to ravage the Planet for centuries. Chopping down trees, choking rivers and oceans, filling them with their own waste. Heedless of the repercussions. They were a disease. That's the word he used. Disease. The Planet had fallen ill with the scourge of the human race. The invention of the Mako reactor was the last straw. It was one thing to devour resources with such reckless abandon. Siphoning from the Lifestream – literally bleeding the Planet dry – that was inexcusable. Enough was enough. As he put it, it was "time to return Her to those whom she belongs".

Sephiroth had been called a lot of things over the years, but an environmentalist was not one of them. Besides, I argued, there weren't any Ancients left. They'd pretty much gone extinct after the Great Calamity. Everyone knew that. He brushed it off like it didn't matter.

"But my people – "

"Don't," he said sharply as he got up to leave. I guess he'd had enough conversation for one day. "You are no Ancient. Your mother was, yes, but your father…he was an ordinary, fallible human."

"So what does that make you?" I asked, to which he replied with a conspiratorial grin,

"The means to an end."


	4. Part 1-3

_Sephiroth_

On reflection, I really shouldn't have been surprised. The look on that poor creature's face when I explained myself…well, it was understandable. I'd gotten carried away as usual. Swept up in the moment, as it were. It hadn't occurred to me that the color draining from her face was distress and not illness. A few more words would have assuaged her fears, but I hadn't thought of that either. I'd simply laid out the bare outline of my intentions and left. Small wonder, then, when I later returned to check on her, that I found the bed empty. The mug of tea I'd made was sitting on the nightstand. It was still full.

I sighed aloud for no one to hear.

Carrying the now-cold drink into the kitchen, I contemplated my next move. It was unlikely the girl would get far. When I'd discovered her in the Shin-Ra laboratory, she was virtually dead. She had tucked herself tightly into a dark corner of her cell, silent and motionless. I wouldn't have noticed her at all if she hadn't glanced in my direction. The strange green glow of her eyes caught my attention immediately. In that moment, she became my charge, and I felt an overwhelming sense of responsibility for her. I had given her a little food and a good long rest, but that wouldn't be nearly enough. At most she would survive for another day, possibly two. Any more than that and…it was too gruesome to consider. If she failed to appear by the end of the next day, I would have to search her out. I had no choice.

It was with some sadness that I poured the tea down the drain. I'd had such high hopes for it. It had a scent remarkably like the night after it snows, when the air is clear and everything feels fresh and renewed. Like winter, if such a thing were possible. Ah well. Perhaps in the morning I would send one of my puppets to fetch another tin.

That made me laugh. How long had I been living here? Months? And no one noticed. No one noticed that, every so often, some townsperson would wander into the abandoned mansion armed with supplies as if preparing for a seige. That person would have no memory of having done so. And no one questioned it! For years those dim-witted sheep at Shin-Ra had been hunting me down. Now I was right under their noses and they hadn't the slightest idea. Fools. They deserved what was coming to them.

That evening I stowed away in the basement of the manor house, barricaded by books and research notes. I thought my great plan was nearly finished. There were only one or two minor details left to be addressed. Yet for every answer I found, two more questions took its place. There was still so much I had to learn. The things I discovered all those years ago only barely scratched the surface. Finally, after hours of reading and pondering and writing things down and scratching things out, I had to admit defeat. Tomorrow was another day.

My head was buzzing as I made my way back upstairs to find the sun peeking up over the horizon. Exhausted, I collapsed onto the bed I had set up for myself. On the nightstand next to me was a mug full of steaming hot liquid.

It had the unmistakable aroma of pine needles.


	5. Part 1-4

_Aeris_

Damn right I ran. Wouldn't you? I was convinced without a shadow of a doubt that the experiments were going to continue – or get worse. After all, Sephiroth said he hated Shinra. Maybe that was because they had figured out his plan and brought it to a screeching halt. And if _Shinra _objected to it on moral grounds, well…I sure as hell wasn't sticking around.

So I ran. If there's one thing I'm good at, it's sneaking around places. I can move without making a sound, and I can hide so perfectly that you'd never know I was there. Sephiroth could've looked right at me and not seen me. Not that it mattered; as I crept from room to room searching for an exit, he was nowhere to be found. I think I covered the entire first floor before I found a door leading outside. It was unlocked. I mean, I can pick a lock if I have to, but that was a nice surprise.

Once I was out, I bolted. And I didn't stop. For hours I ran as fast as my legs could carry me. I only stopped because I realized I had no idea where I was. Everything around me was wild and unfamiliar. There was no point in going back, either – first because I didn't know how (I had run sort of blindly) and second because I didn't know where that was. Even if I was somehow able to get back to that mansion, I still wouldn't know where I was. Midgar? Junon? Wutai? I'd be right back where I started. Nope, that was out. No moving ahead and no going back. Nothing left to do but make the best of the situation.

It wasn't the first time I'd had to make due on my own. It was, however, the first time I'd had to do it with so _little. _The neighborhood I'd stumbled into wasn't like the lower city I grew up in. I knew how to beg, steal and borrow. I could hold my own in a fight. Like I said before, I could go virtually anywhere unnoticed. Those skills were no good to me here, because here, everyone else had them too. You can't steal food from someone who hasn't eaten in a week. You also can't fight someone over housing that doesn't exist. If the slums'd had slums, this would be it.

After a couple days, basic instinct took over. I slept in a giant piece of disused pipe, and I drank rain water that had pooled in a rusted pot nearby. Pretty disgusting, I know. I would've tried to make my way home, but by then I was really just lucky to be alive. I was beyond exhausted. I mean _beyond. _Moving my head to the side and opening my eyes was enough to wear me out. I'd sit up, cough, and have to take a nap afterward. Pathetic.

You know, I say "a couple days", but the thing is I'm not sure _how_ long I was there for. All I know is that, somewhere near dawn, I caught sight of it: a warm, cackling campfire not far from where I was. There was a group of people sitting around it, talking and laughing – _and cooking. _The smell wafted over to me and I almost fainted. A deep primal need stirred inside of me.

I had to get my hands on it.

It didn't matter how. It didn't matter if I got caught.

_I just had to have it._

Slowly I dragged myself forward, too focused on the camp to watch where I was going. A branch snapped underneath me with a resounding _CRACK. _It scared the hell out of me. Panicked, I scurried back into my hiding spot, but it was too late. The sound had gotten the attention of the camp. One of them jumped up and grabbed a weapon that had been lying on the ground. It was a sword that, no joke, was bigger than I was. I'm not making this up. The thing was _huge_. I would've made a comment about overcompensating if I hadn't been terrified for my life.

It was pretty obvious where the sound had come from, so it wasn't exactly shocking that he made a beeline straight for me. He stopped a few feet away and stared like he knew me. I was okay with that; once he got a little closer, I recognized his face too.

"Cloud! What is it?" shouted a female voice from the camp. The man in the SOLDIER uniform tipped his head to the side. His sword, thank the gods, stayed right where it was.

"I _think…_it's the girl from the lab."

Seconds later they had swarmed around me – the SOLDIER, the girl, and a giant of a man who was cradling a machine gun in his arm. No, wait. The machine gun _was _his arm. _What in the name of Gaia…?_

"Oh my god," the girl murmured under her breath. She crouched down to get a better look at me. "What happened? Are you okay?"

"How did she get here?" the SOLDIER asked flatly. And a little rudely, I might add. Even Machine Gun Guy scowled.

"C'mon man, take it easy. She probably ran away. I mean damn, it's Shinra. Who knows what they were doin' to her in there?"

The SOLDIER shook his head. "I don't know. It's not that easy to get away. I've…I mean, you can't. You just can't. Something's not right here."

"_Hey,_" the girl said sharply in what I can only imagine was a perfect imitation of his mother. Then, turning to Machine Gun Guy, she added, "Barrett? Can you take – what's your name sweetie?"

"Aeris." I wasn't thrilled about volunteering it so easy, but what else could I do?

"Can you take Aeris here back to the tent, maybe get her something to eat? I have to talk to Cloud for a second."

Her tone didn't go unnoticed. As Machine Gun Guy – sorry, Barrett – helped me to my feet, the SOLDIER shrank into the background. She got up and pulled him away so fast I thought she was going to break his neck. Which is impressive, considering the guy had to be at least one and a half times the size of her. Off to the side, they thought their conversation was private. It wasn't.

"_Cloud. _What's gotten into you?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," he said, folding his arms defensively across his chest.

"Seriously? You're treating that poor girl like she's dirt under your shoe! You have no idea what she's been through. I mean, look at her!"

"Exactly. Look at her. Look at her eyes, Tifa. _Those are Mako eyes. _I'd know them anywhere. D'you know what they do to people they inject with that stuff? You know what they turn them into? I'm telling you, it's bad news."

"No," she said mockingly, "please, tell me. What _do _they turn them into?"

Now he was uncomfortable. He could barely look her in the eye. "You know. She could be, umm…a spy…or something," he offered lamely.

"Right. Well, I'd just like to remind you that they injected _you _with Mako, and if you're a spy for Shinra, you're a pretty terrible one."

He must've been half-expecting her to say that, because he broke out in a big doofy grin. Fine. At least he acknowledged that he was lousy at whatever it was he thought he was doing.

"Look, here's the thing," she went on, dropping her voice down low. "Whoever she is, she must be important to Shinra. If she's that important to them, we might be able to use her. Know what I mean?"

By then we were out of earshot and I couldn't hear what the SOLDIER's response was, if anything.

Great. Sephiroth wanted my blood, and these guys wanted…I don't know, leverage or something? They both seemed to have something against Shinra, and to be honest I really didn't want anything to do with either one of them. But the SOLDIER and his friends were offering me food and I was in no position to say no to that.

Not just yet, anyway.


End file.
